1929: JULIAN STANLEY WISE AND THE ROANOKE LIFESAVING AND FIRST AID CREW

In 1909, Julian Stanley Wise witnessed a drowning in Virginia’s Roanoke River. Reflecting back on this experience as a young boy, Wise stated “Right then I resolved that I was going to become a lifesaver…Never again would I watch a man die when he could be saved.”

On May 28, 1928, Wise and nine coworkers at the Norfolk and Western Railway organized the world’s first volunteer rescue squad: The Roanoke Life Saving and First Aid Crew. Wise demonstrated the concept and need of the squad by staging a mock rescue in 1929, sinking a 250-pound dummy in a pond and calling out the rescue squad. The city of Roanoke, impressed by the demonstration, agreed to provide communication support. A local funeral home donated an ambulance, and Wise’s vision became a reality. The Roanoke Life Saving and First Aid Crew was the forerunner of today’s pre-hospital emergency medical services.

Ten years after the squad was formally established as part of the city infrastructure, Wise wrote, “There is no comprehensive history of the safety movement; someday it will be written and we shall find it a romance of high adventure.” Julian Wise died in Roanoke on July 22, 1985, at the age of 85. never having his vision of a “comprehensive history of the safety movement” realized.

In 1988, with the support of a grant from the Commonwealth of Virginia, the Julian Stanley Wise Foundation was formed to chronicle the history of the volunteer rescue squad movement and emergency medical. On June 8, 1991, The Julian Stanley Wise Foundation opened the To The Rescue Museum in Roanoke. Julian Wise’s widow Ruth, was present at the opening.

Submitted to NEMSM May 2011 by To the Rescue Museum/National EMS Museum Foundation Volunteer